The Moment
by LucyLuna
Summary: While he smoked a cigarette on his apartment's fire escape, Aaron considered the words that had haunted his restless sleep and made a decision about the Prowler's future once and for all. Part fifteen of the My Memories Came Back as Someone Else series. One-shot.


_The Moment_

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Face taut and eyes faraway, Aaron threw back the covers of his bed and got up. Padding out to his living room, he picked up his pack of cigarettes from the table next to the lamp and his lighter from the coffee table. Putting both in one hand, he walked over to the room's window. For a brief moment, he stared out into the illuminated darkness, taking in the familiar, but still new sight outside. Aaron then popped open the window of his apartment and climbed onto his fire escape. Once outside, he closed his window half-way and leaned forward on the railing of his fire escape. Putting the cigarette between his lips, he lit the end and breathed in. As he held the smoke in his lungs, he let the words that had been haunting his dreams tonight (and the last, and the night before that, and that) be recalled with perfect, lucid clarity:

_ "…It just makes me wonder if he's really as bad a guy as we've been led to believe, you know? Or if maybe he's not trying to turn over a new leaf?" _

_ "I gotta say, this hero thing you're doing, it looks good on you." _

_ "I wish he would finally just become a vigilante once and for all." _

He released the cigarette smoke from his lungs and let it escape from his mouth in a slow, even stream. Starting on another drag, Aaron mused on how he didn't spend a lot of time committing words not necessary to his survival or livelihood to memory, but each time Gwen had spoken almost highly of the Prowler he had. She was just a kid, he knew, but not a little one like his nephew. Gwen was almost an adult just like he was. It made her words mean more. Or at least that was what he felt. He wasn't sure Jeff would agree if he told him about the things Gwen said, but he did know his brother would put a stop to her babysitting his little nephew if he knew the almost favorable things she'd said. He was pissed as it was that Miles kept talking about him like he was the seconding coming of Spider-Woman. It wasn't good for Miles to be looking up to somebody who was still a villain in just about everybody else's books or for his social life. Kids were cruel. Even the ones Miles was going around with which Aaron knew with 100% certainty were a better kind than he and Jeff used to hang with. Aaron had been giving the whole hero thing _ a lot _ more thought these days as a result.

He'd questioned Spider-Woman a bit and she seemed more than excited at the prospect of him taking up the mantle of a hero, but Aaron hadn't felt too swayed. Spider-Woman's opinion meant fuck all to him. She'd got him nearly thrown in Rikers at least a half-dozen times since she showed up on the scene a year and a half ago. Truthfully, he felt a little scornful of her and her "heroics". Sometimes, it just felt like recklessness. He didn't know if she had a death-wish for herself or if it was just inexperience, but it set Aaron on edge. If he'd pulled the kind of stunts she did on almost the regular when he was just starting out, he didn't think he'd have made it to the Prowler. It was damn good she seemed to have luck in spades.

Unlike Gwen and his nephew.

How the two of them had become magnets for such dangerous situations, he didn't know, but Aaron was going to do whatever he could to protect them. Miles was his nephew. The one thing that was completely _ good _ in his life and Aaron had to do right by him even if it was going to kill him. The kid deserved the world and he would do his part to make that happen. As for Gwen… Well, maybe he didn't _ really _ know her, seeing as he'd only interacted with her a handful of times over the last year, but he felt like he did. It was clear Gwen was a strong girl. She knew how to be brave and stand up. He admired her for it. There weren't a lot of people who could do what she did, grown-up or no. Aaron also felt a lot for Gwen from the bits he'd picked up that hinted at where that strength came from.

The kid had lived through some real devastating shit before she and Miles were kidnapped and their lives joined. Aaron sort of knew what it was like to lose your best friend in the whole world, but only a little. Jeff was still here and breathing. Sometimes even in the same room as him— Even if he didn't really recognize the person he was these days. He wasn't the big brother he'd idolized when he was a kid, wasn't the homie who showed him what the life could get you. Somewhere, somehow, the Jeff he knew fell down dead on New York's streets and Officer Davis was resurrected in his place.

Yeah, Aaron got Gwen. It was why he was thinking it was time he stopped dabbling with the hero thing and commit. She'd had enough heartbreak and deserved protection from any more he could save her from. Aaron knew guarding Gwen would be a lot easier if she felt she could put all her trust in him. Her almost off-hand comments to him over the last year told Aaron a lot. She appreciated his help, saw he might be capable of more than thievery, maiming, and murder, and she was growing tired of seeing him not embrace that side capable of good. She probably wouldn't trust him all the way until he shed the villain-life for the hero one. He would do that. For her, for Miles. The kids deserved his best.

The first step to doing that was pretty simple. He had to start fixing some of his mistakes. There'd be no un-killing or healing the hurts he caused, but he could return the shit he stole back to where it belonged. For this step, he would try to take as little credit as he could. It would get in the way of fixing them for one, especially once it started to get out what he was doing, but he also didn't feel like he deserved any praise for just making up for his bad behavior. It was the second step in this plan of his that he'd use to start building up his name as a villain-turned-hero. Once he returned all of the stolen things that he could, he would start teaming up with Spider-Woman and helping her out.

Aaron sighed at the thought and put his cigarette out on the railing of his apartment's fire escape. Fuck, was she going to be smug once she realized he was joining the hero gig. No doubt she would think it was because of _ her _ and not Miles and Gwen no matter what he said. Oh well, he supposed. If that was the price he had to pay for partnering up with her, he would do it.

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**I spent a while considering _A Rooftop Heart-to-Heart_ and came to the conclusion you guys might like a story that focuses on the moment where Aaron makes his decision to switch to heroism. How do you like it?**

**Thank you for reading!**


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